New Fic: For GMTH, in thanks for the many hours of reading Smutmas provided
Title: The Circle of Light
Author: Josan
Rating: NC-17
Pairing: Gina's favourites.
Disclaimer: I don't own them, I'm only playing with them.
Beta: sylvadin. Thank you, ma chère. Your comments are always what I need to read.
Summary: Nope. You're either going to going to read this or not, so why provide you with a summary? Besides, I have no idea how to summarise this.

Warnings: I've been reading John Preston, which means that this ficlet has been influenced by one of his novels. If you've read John Preston, I don't need to say more. If you haven't, what are you waiting for?

Warning 2: It may squick some of you, though there is nothing to do with bodily fluids, whips, the usual instruments that one associates with BDSM. In fact, it's amazing how a simple little Muggle item can be used so very effectively in the hands of a Master.

Dedication: This is in thanks for all the time and effort you, Gina, have put into this fest since Day 1. What a wonder you are! I shall miss the fest and the challenge of writing this particular pairing.

Because only for you, ma très chère Gina, would I ever write this pairing.

(Don't forget to act surprised, eh? :-)

**********




He stepped into the circle of light and waited. With more patience than anyone knowing him would have granted him.

He stood, head up, hair pulled back with a black ribbon, looking like the proud, aristocratic, pure-blood that he was. Generations of selective breeding had produced more than the filled Gringotts vault, more than the better-than-average magical skills. It was responsible for the pale, almost white hair, the strong chin, the aquiline nose, the heavily-hooded eyes and the mouth that more than hinted at his sensual nature.

He was the embodiment of all that was beautiful, all that was powerful among his kind.

And here he stood, in a circle of light, surrounded by dark, waiting.

He allowed himself a small sigh of frustration. He'd never been kept waiting this long before and it was beginning to irritate him. But it wouldn't do to be blatant about this annoyance and so, with effort, he stilled the need to wriggle, to demonstrate his superior status by walking away.

There was nothing, no one, stopping him from doing so.

Just the need for what was to come.

A footstep.

A soft, barely audible footstep.

He had been waiting for that sound and it sent a small shiver up his spine. Finally, at last! Though he dared not say it.

He understood the rules and speech was not one of them. Never one of them.

The footsteps came closer, stopping behind him. He didn't have to turn around to know that the person – the man, for he well knew who it was – had stopped out of the range of the light.

Another waiting game, this one more nerve-racking because he had no idea what was to follow.

He came to this circle for that very reason. Never knowing. Anticipating.

Never disappointed.

The footsteps moved to the right of him, the man still in the dark.

Once, after standing behind him for the longest time, the footsteps had just continued on their way and all of Lucius's anticipation had erupted in anger.

The man had only laughed at him and pointed out that Lucius's need for punishment had not been denied. After all, wasn't not being punished a punishment of sorts? And that was the purpose of the game. Wasn't it?

Lucius, through gritted teeth, had been forced to admit that it was.

Moreover, the other had smiled, a smile that had sent more of those anticipatory shivers up Lucius's spine, since he never repeated himself, now Lucius never had to imagine that scenario ever again. Did he?

So, now, when the footsteps went off, Lucius knew that the game was still on. His nerves knew it as well and they made themselves known, for the man's never repeating himself was double-barrelled knowledge. Lucius remembered well all the details of previous encounters and knew they would not be repeated, without knowing what lay ahead.

Anticipation, he had well discovered, was quite an aphrodisiac.

No less this time.

His cock began responding to his anticipation.

He resisted the urge to touch himself. He knew better than to do so without permission. Should it be given. Which it rarely was.

The footsteps came closer to the circle, to just in front of him.

"Head down," snarled the voice. "Who do you think you are, looking at me? An equal? Bah!"

Lucius wanted to remind the man that he, Lucius Malfoy, was pure of blood but bit his tongue. In this particular situation, he was no longer the one with power. Once he had stepped within the circle, he had handed over all rights to the man.

He dropped his head so that his gaze was directed to the man's booted feet.

"Better."

Involuntarily, Lucius felt a sense of well-being rise in him at the tone of approval. It was probably going to be the last approval he would hear for some time and he would use it to build up his stamina to deal with whatever the man was planning for him.

His eyes downcast, he could only imagine what the sounds meant. A chair. Being dragged manually to whichever position the man judged correct. The slight 'whoosh' of a body settling against the padding of the chair, the sharp tattoo of fingernails against wood, against the arm of the chair.

"The robe, get rid of it. Slowly," the man chastised as Lucius's fingers had risen quickly to obey.

He held his breath but nothing happened. As gracefully as he could manage, trying to make the gesture as sensual as possible, Lucius did as commanded. He had hoped to garner some sign, no matter how small, of the man's interest, maybe his intent but, as usual, nothing.

He released the last button on the exclusively designed robe, an icy-grey silk that matched the colour of his eyes, and waited to shrug the garment off his shoulders, allowing gravity to take the heavy sleeves down his arms.

This was a dangerous game he was playing. Should the man take offense at the procedure, Lucius could well be left alone. He was, however, banking on the fact that the man did not repeat himself. Oh, there would be reprisal of some kind, but that was all part of the game.

From the sigh, Lucius sensed more amusement than annoyance. That boded well for the game.

The robe was now a puddle on the floor. He had, of course, been naked under it. Lucius stepped out of its folds, revealing that he was also barefoot. With an inbred sense of disregard for the expensive material, he kicked it aside so that it was partially out of the circle.

There was a snap of fingers and the robe rose into the air, hung there for a moment before disappearing into the dark.

"You won't be needing that. Not for a long while," promised the voice that seemed to Lucius to deepen into a register where each syllable stroked his overly-aware nervous system.

The nearly silent 'whoosh' warned him that the man had risen while the circulating footsteps told him that he was being inspected.

"Yes," said the man pensively, "yes, I think that'll do."

Lucius found he was bracing himself, his feet pressing down on the smooth floor, his muscles tensing in preparation. The satisfaction in the man's voice meant that a game plan had been selected and all Lucius could do was wait and accept.

And not speak.

If a word passed his lips, the game ended immediately and the man left him as he was.

Sounds were permitted, but it was a sense of pride with Lucius that they slipped out of him only when he positively could no longer hold them in. He could not do much in the circle, but he could try and deny the man the satisfaction of knowing he had won until Lucius could not deny his having lost.

And a Malfoy, he had had beaten into him, never admitted defeat.

Still, standing there, naked, open to the eyes examining him, it took all that he was not to grab his robe and stomp away.

It was only the need to receive what this man could give him that kept him there, standing, shivering, not from the cold because the circle was warm, but from need.

The chair moved closer to the circle so that Lucius could make out the pair of polished black half-boots of the crossed ankles when the man sat down.

"Keep still."

Lucius nodded his understanding of his instructions. The wait, he knew from experience, would be soon over.

What delicious torment...?

He gasped as something bite down on his right nipple.

It took him more than a moment to figure out what it was. The implement was not part of his experience, being, first of all, a Muggle item, and secondly, not anything he would ever have had to utilise.

A wooden clothes peg. One with a spring.

He had only before seen one in a book he had lazily taken off a shelf in the Hogwarts library many years ago.

The surprise of it took his attention away from the pain building up in his nipple, a pain that was augmented when a second clothes peg attached itself with enthusiasm to his left nipple.

Lucius felt...almost let down. A Muggle implement...on his body? When he thought of it, it was almost an insult. He who had never touched anything that was not of his world, never allowed his skin to come into contact with anything not made by the best couturier of his kind...

He nearly raised his head to confront the man.

Who was probably waiting for him to do so, thereby giving him permission to walk away.

Lucius took a deep breath, sent the insult away from his mind and waited.

The next clothes pin selected the soft skin by his armpit. Lucius controlled his wince. The small pieces of wood looked fairly innocuous. They were anything but he discovered as another snapped itself a small mouthful of skin from the fold of his hip.

They appeared, one after another, biting and never really allowing him the time to absorb the pain of their bites. Lucius was surprised to find it growing difficult to breath through the accumulated assault. Each, of itself, was merely an annoyance, but together...

They attacked one by one, settling on skin that Lucius was barely aware was part of him. His nipples hurt, true, and that he had expected for the man was fond of clamping them. But to discover that the skin at his armpit was as sensitive... That the tightness of his abs, a part of him that he did notice with pride as it was still flat, not a common occurrence in a wizard of his years, was no deterrence to the gaping mouths that fed off him... That the folds of his navel could be ringed in such surprising pain...

And all this the result of Muggle laundry items?

Lucius swallowed hard as he looked down at himself, at the lines of pins that decorated his torso in diagonals, from hip through navel to the opposite nipple and armpit, and wondered at the deviousness of such plain things.

"Arms out at shoulder level."

Lucius obeyed quite quickly for him, hoping that the pins would fly off. Well, some of them. Most certainly the ones that held only a very small bit of skin in their grip.

After all, these were Muggle creations. How well could they function?

All too well.

He heard a soft chuckle coming from the dark and knew that his action had been anticipated by the man.

As had the manacles that dropped from above and clamped onto his wrists, holding his arms tautly out and above, the fetters that suddenly appeared on his ankles, pulling his stance apart so that he now stood, feet at wider than shoulder distance.

There was no give in the fetters, none also in the manacles. These last were held in place not by chains but by a length of iron, which meant that no matter what was done to him Lucius could not escape by sagging or dropping to the floor.

He felt the first sense of disquiet.

He nearly raised his head.

"Do you wish to end this?" asked the man, disdain barely covered by concern.

Lucius nearly panicked. To end now meant that the man might not be prepared to play the game again when Lucius next needed it.

He shook his head.

The man stood up and approached the circle. Lucius tried to keep his eyes on the boots that just entered the circle. He did. But the need to see his tormentor...

The trousers were black, wool probably and fit the man as only trousers tailored for the wearer could. The only break in the colour was the small, discreet buckle of silver, which caught his eyes. He forced himself to look above. There was a shirt, in black also. Like the trousers, a black that seemed to absorb light rather than reflect it. A shirt, whose buttons were undone, which was closed in such a way that no skin could be seen until the upper chest where the opening material revealed a hint of black hair teasing the pale arrow of skin.

Lucius knew what that hair felt like. The rough-silkiness of it when it abraded his tortured nipples.

Would it happen this time?

He couldn't see the face. To have done so would have meant disregarding the order to keep his head down.

But he did see the man gesture with his hand and several clothes pins suddenly hover in the light. Lucius braced himself.

He had been right to do so as, in response to some gesture, they lined up along his biceps and one by one, alternating first one arm then the next, clamped onto the soft dangling skin from elbow to underarm.

Lucius gasped in shock at the build-up of pain. And remembered his grandmother. His father's mother. The old bitch. Who had never raised her voice in disapproval of his childhood behaviour. Who had never glared at him. All she had done was pull him close to her, in what others saw as a loving gesture, and with the tips of her fingernails, pinch the soft skin of his inner arm.

He remembered the sharpness of the pain had guaranteed that, whatever he had been doing that had caught her attention, would not be repeated and that she would just as calmly order one of the house-elves to beat him that night before bed.

He hadn't thought about that in years.

He did now, as tears welled in his eyes, as he bit his lips to hold back any expression of pain, as he had those long-ago days when he'd been beaten.

The man would not win, just as his father's mother hadn't, not at the end, when, at twelve, he had volunteered to take his turn in vigil by her bedside and had stood there, alone, having cast Silencio on the room, holding the bottle of potion that would have saved her life as she gaped unbelievingly at him.

The soft chuckle brought him back to the circle.

Lucius blinked back the tears to see another group of pins appear in the range of his vision.

He licked his swollen lips and wondered where...!

FUCK!

The soft skin of his inner thighs.

Fuck, fuck, fuck, that... It more than hurt. It was... It was...

Dear Merlin!

It was making him hard!

The chuckle was louder. "Such a pain slut, you are."

Lucius closed his eyes and concentrated on controlling his response.

Not that he could do much about his cock. It behaved independently of his will at these times. Out of the circle, he was in charge. In the circle, he handed over authority of his body and his damn cock behaved as though it knew it. And it took advantage to get back at him for all the times he hadn't permitted it behave as it wanted.

The man stepped so that he was now behind Lucius.

Lucius tried to move his body. It was bad enough when those Muggle contraptions appeared in front of him, but behind? He tried to turn his head only to have it lurch forward from a hard slap. "Did I give you permission to look?"

Biting his lips, Lucius shook his head. He knew better, but the sudden fear of where those things were going to alight next...

Along the edge of his arse cheeks, from hip to arsehole.

Not that the pain was more severe than anything that had been done to him yet, but still, the fact that it had been a simultaneous grab on both buttocks...

Lucius finally caught his breath and remembered a previous time in this circle, the time with a cane, with a certain nostalgia.

The pins captured the flesh along the back of his ribs, first one side, then, once Lucius's gasps had calmed, the other.

The image of a hedgehog appear in his mind and it was all Lucius could do to stop a bout of hysterical laughter. Laughter was not an approved sound.

But the man had caught it and Lucius knew that his resemblance to the small rodent had increased when he felt the bites, one after the other, along the back of his thighs, down calves to ankles.

He had barely recovered from that when again with particular care, the man placed his toys of torment along the back of his knees.

Lucius bit down hard on his lips but couldn't prevent the moan from escaping. It was growing too hard to worry about such minor matters when his whole body felt aflame with aching, throbbing pain.

The man seemed to think it was enough for the nonce, as he went and sat down again, probably, thought Lucius, to see where else he could stick his vicious little toys.

His head hung low as, over long minutes, the build-up of pain didn't abate, his nervous system did not acclimatise to it and his bloody cock fed off it.

The aroma of freshly brewed coffee penetrated his haze of self.

Lucius slitted his eyes open and used the excuse of the scent to sniff back some of the wetness that was dripping off his nose.

Coffee.

And his favourite brew, if he was not mistaken. Bloody bastard!

"Ah, feeling better. Good. Because we're not quite done."

Concentrating on the man rather than the limitless pain, Lucius identified the sound of cup on saucer, of saucer on table top, of the chair being pushed back...

When had all that arrived? How long had he been fighting his way through that haze of pain?

But the man was right there and was demanding his attention.

"Finding it a bit hard to focus, are you? Here, let me help."

The first pin clamped itself between his balls and perineum. The pain was such that Lucius blacked out for a moment.

"Oh, come now. You're made of sturdier stuff than that, surely? Must I remind you that you're a Pureblood?"

One day, Lucius swore to himself, he would wipe the mockery out of that voice.

He steadied himself and tried to take all the weight off the manacles. That would show the man just what blood meant.

"Not bad. Let's see how you respond to this."

He couldn't see for the tears that flowed when the wooden mouth settled between his balls.

"Nice delineation," commented the man. "You've always had balls, Lucius. No one's ever denied you that."

Lucius yelped when the pins took up the looseness of his scrotum.

"Nice balls, Lucius. The clichèd goose eggs."

Lucius tried to move his feet further apart, hoping that would relieve some of the pressure, with no success.

"You know, about the only part of you that I've neglected, other than your face...and that I shall not touch. Wouldn't do to send you home to Narcissa with anything obvious, now, would it? If I remember correctly, she doesn't approve of our little games. Pity. I think she would be really turned on by the picture you make."

Lucius whimpered.

"Yes, really beautiful. All that pain, still under control. And your wonderful cock, so responsive to it."

Lucius mewled.

"Ah, you've guessed. Still I wonder if that will be of any help whatsoever?"

The clothes pin the man called up did not select one place to rest. It bit at the base of his cock, allowing enough time for the pain to press its way past all the other, then it moved on, a centimetre at a time, up his wildly irresponsible responsive member, to the head where, after a flick of its longer ends, it settled with his unrolled foreskin clasped in its 'beak'.

The manacles were the only things keeping Lucius up.

So it was some time before he realised that the pins were releasing, one by one.

He wouldn't have thought that the pain could ratchet up so high but it did.

And with it came what he had been needing. Why he allowed the man to do what he did. The anguish in this body hovered then slipped beyond pain to the rarely attained world of pleasure.

A pleasure which sent him to the edge of consciousness.

A hand pulled back on his sodden hair, allowing his bleeding lips to close onto the glass that, tilted up, poured a dribble of cool water into mouth and throat dried and tight from unreleased profanity and screams.

He was barely aware of the care through the haze of pleasure.

But the care signalled...

It couldn't be over...could it?

He had won, hadn't he?

Not a scream had passed his lips. Not a word.

It shouldn't end, should it?

Now?

No.

There was still more blessed torment to come.

Not all the pins had been removed.

Through bleary eyes he could make out the two still on his chest, on senseless nipples.

And, when his head was released, he could see down himself to those on scrotum and cock.

His damn treacherous cock, ridding high against his bruised belly.

He nearly begged then.

The pain...

He needed a bit more to return to that wonderful world.

Lucius looked up and tried to find the face of the man, but it was back in the shadows.

"These," said the man, "I shall remove myself."

His nipples protested vehemently at their release.

Oh, bloody hell! He didn't want to faint, but it seemed like such a good idea.

Especially when the man flicked first one swollen nub then the other.

"Dear boy, if this is how you respond to such a minor play, how will you respond when I free your balls?"

Lucius nearly begged.

Then got what he wanted as his aching balls celebrated their freedom.

"I think that you are shamming, my friend. You moan and groan, you sag, you play at swooning, yet all the while your cock tells me that it is loving this game."

And it was.

It was hard, so very painfully hard.

"Pain, Lucius, adores you. And you it. I'll never understand why you fight it so much until the need for it sends you to this circle. We could have so much fun together playing the game outside the circle."

The offer was genuine, but it was one that Lucius would never allow himself to accept. Here, in the circle, he could pretend it wasn't he, not the real Lucius Malfoy, needing pain.

"But it would be a shame to leave matters as they are."

Oh, Merlin! Finally!

Lucius arched his hips forward, offering his cock.

First there would be pain, but that would be followed by the soothing touch of the man's hand on him, bringing him pleasure greater than the pain he had endured.

He could hardly wait.

His breathing grew faster, his nerves shivered, his muscles twitched.

The hand was reaching for the last pin.

Taunting him.

But release...

Oh, the blessedness of the release...

Lucius whimpered as the hand came closer to his aching cock...

"LUCIUS! Wake up! You're having a nightmare!"

Lucius Malfoy sat up panting and unaware of where he was.

"Lucius. You're in your bed. You're safe."

He blinked and looked around, not really seeing anything other than the small circle of light that surrounded Narcissa as she sat on the side of his bed.

"Nar...Narcissa?"

"Yes, my dear." Her voice had lost its sharpness and was all soothing. "It's all right, Lucius. You're not in Azkaban. We're in Malfoy Manor. Do you remember?"

Lucius dropped his face into his hands and scrubbed at the wetness he found there. He pulled up his knees in hopes of covering the erection that was now subsiding.

"Were you dreaming about Azkaban? You sounded in such torment."

Lucius knew that he had to get rid of her before he said something that would make their fragile relationship flounder or even be destroyed.

If she touched him...

His body ached so from the unresolved arousal of his dream.

"'Tsall right. Sorry I disturbed you." He dropped his hands, but didn't look up at her. Voldemort was dead and they were alive. That should have been enough. "Go back to bed." He took a deep breath and released it slowly. "I'm all right now. Go back to bed," he repeated.

She said nothing. Once she would have slipped into bed with him and held him until he'd fallen asleep once more.

No longer.

Now she rose and went out, taking the light with her.

Lucius slid back under the bedclothes, damp from his dream, and curled up on one side, ignoring his now softening cock. He pulled his knees close to his chest and wrapped his arms around them,

"Damn you," he whispered. "Damn you, Severus. You weren't supposed to die. Now who will play with me in the circle of light?"

*****The End*****